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Saying Goodbye to Yesterday

I’m trying something new this New Years Eve. I was never much of a fan of the holiday – it’s just a little too much. If New Years was a wine, it would be a crazy powerhouse, over-extracted, over-oaked fruit bomb…in my opinion. While such wines (and holidays) can be fun and sexy on first approach, they often over-promise and under-deliver (a sure fire recipe for disappointment).

Over the years my celebrations have ranged from high brow to no brow, from tacky to tasteful, from intimate to Times Square (something everybody should experience no more than once in their lifetime). There has always been a sense of forced festivity to my celebrations, so this year I’m going in a different direction.

I will be spending the evening in quiet solitary reflection. I think the coming of a new year is the perfect time to look back – not nostalgically, but in reflection of life’s changes over the past year. Change has been the greatest constant in my life over the past few years and it hasn’t always been easy or pleasant.

…So tonight I’m going to sit in the comfort of my home, have a nice meal and some good wine (of course!) I might watch a movie, catch up on some reading or listen to a little music. At some point in the evening, I am going to sit in silence and acknowledge the past year. I’ll celebrate the triumphs and mourn the losses. I’ll look back at the sum of my experiences and try to understand how they have made me who I am in this place and time and circumstance. I’ll look at this ‘chapter’ with tenderness and gratitude before I ‘turn the page’ and turn out the lights.

Tomorrow I’ll commit pen to a clean sheet of paper. I will not linger on the events of the past. They are part of me but don’t define my future trajectory. It’s a new year, and a new opportunity to re-group, re-calibrate, and move on.